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Or whether doth my mind, being crowned with you,Drink up the monarch's plague, this flattery?Or whether shall I say, mine eye saith true,And that your love taught it this alchemy,To make of monsters and things indigestSuch cherubins as your sweet self resemble,Creating every bad a perfect best,As fast as objects to his beams assemble?O! 'tis the first, 'tis flattery in my seeing,And my great mind most kingly drinks it up:Mine eye well knows what with his gust is 'greeing, And to his palate doth prepare the cup:If it be poisoned, 'tis the lesser sinThat mine eye loves it and doth first begin.

This
sonnet, taking up again the ideas of
the previous one, hinges on a quasi-philosophical conundrum as to which
of the two, the eye or the mind, are guilty of the greatest sin, the
mind
in being deceived by flattery, or the eye in transforming all base
images
by a sort of arcane alchemy into images of the youth. Why either of
these
should be regarded as sinful is not clearly stated, unless it is
harking
back once again to the possibility of idolatry and idolatrous loving,
first
raised in Sonnet 105
and made the subject of various speculations thereafter.

Here the possibility
that the eye and the mind
are independent (or might be so) is exploited in a way that befits the
conceit
of a metaphysical poem, without any sure resolution being achieved. One
is left at the end doubting which of the two, the eye or the mind, is
the
most guilty, or indeed whether either is guilty of anything other than
too
much loving.

The 1609 Quarto Version

OR whether doth my minde being crown'd with you
Drinke vp the monarks plague this flattery ?
Or whether ſhall I ſay mine eie ſaith true,
And that your loue taught it this Alcumie?
To make of monſters,and things indigeſt,
Such cherubines as your ſweet ſelf reſemble,
Creating euery bad a perfect beſt
As faſt as obiects to his beames aſſemble:
Oh tis the firſt,tis flatry in my ſeeing,
And my great minde moſt kingly drinkes it vp,
Mine eie well knowes what with his guſt is greeing,
And to his pallat doth prepare the cup.
If it be poiſon'd,tis the leſſer ſinne,
That mine eye loues it and doth firſt beginne.

Commentary

1. Or whether doth my mind, being crowned with you,

Or whether ..... Or
whether (l.3)
= Is it the case that .... or is it rather that. The alternatives are
that
the mind, being flattered by the visions and descriptions that the eye
sends
it, deceives itself into thinking that all objects are like the youth;
or
that the eye itself has learned how to transmute all things into the
appearance
of the beloved, having been taught to do so by love of the youth. The
distinction
is an artificial one, because even in the psychology of the time, eye
and
mind were more or less inseparable, each being dependent on the other.
However
the thought is a continuation of that worked over in the previous
sonnet,
and is treated as a pleasing poetic illusion in the shape of a
metaphysical
conceit.

2. Drink up the monarch's plague, this flattery?

this flattery - the flattering visions
that the eye sends it, all resembling the youth according to the eye's
account.
the monarch's plague - flattery was like a disease which
infected monarchs
in that it prevented them from seeing the truth. The flattery in this
instance
is presumably that of the mind thinking itself to be loved by the
youth,
a possible illusion fed by the eye's willingness to serve up
continually
visions of the beloved which are in fact other objects which have been
transmuted
into him by the eye's dexterity.

3. Or whether shall I say, mine eye saith true,

Or whether - see above, line 1.

4. And that your love taught it this alchemy,

alchemy = the science which studied
how to turn base metals into gold. The eye is turning base objects into
visions of the youth, as described in the next four lines. There was a
tendency
to regard alchemists as charlatans, and alchemy as trickery. (See for
example
Ben Jonson's play, The Alchemist). Here the
secondary suggestion
might be that your love is illusory, and teaches
one how to be dishonest
with oneself. Flattery and alchemy are combined also in Sonnet 33, Full many a glorious morning have I seen
Flatter the mountain-tops with sovereign eye,
Kissing with golden face the meadows green,
Gilding pale streams with heavenly alchemy;
a combination which leads to eventual disappointment.

5. To make of monsters and things indigest

indigest
= unformed, monstrous,
undigested. Shakespeare only uses the word twice, here and in King
John,
where it is used as a noun meaning 'formless and shapeless confusion'.

Be of good
comfort, prince; for you are born
To set a form upon that indigest
Which he hath left so shapeless and so rude.
KJ.V.7.25-7.

to his beams assemble = come into
the orbit of its (the eye's) sight. The eye was supposed to send out
particles,
or a flux, which enveloped the objects towards which it was aimed. All
such
objects the eye is deemed to convert into images of the beloved by
means
of the alchemy mentioned in line 4.

9. O! 'tis the first, 'tis flattery in my seeing,

It is the first option that he decides is
responsible for his behaviour (see note to line 1). The mind has been
flattered
by the eye which has fed it the drink of perpetual images of the
perfect
youth.

10. And my great mind most kingly drinks it up:

my great mindmost kingly -
great, because it is kingly. The imagery of the monarch is being
developed
after its introduction initially in line 1. The idea of flattery as a
drink,
even a poisoned drink, is not uncommon, as indeed the reference to it
as
the monarch's plague makes clear, for it is
the inevitable companion
of princes throughout history. The metaphor of the poisoned drink is
however
only used once elsewhere by Shakespeare, in Henry V. (See below, note
to
line 13).

11. Mine eye well knows what with his gust is 'greeing,

his gust = its (the mind's) taste
and desires. gust is from the Latin gustus,
a tasting.
'greeing = agreeing, agreeable.

12. And to his palate doth prepare the cup:

And to his palate = and according
to the tastes of his palate (i.e. the mind's; but it could be the
eye's,
if his refers to the eye). doth prepare
the cup - the cup
of flattery, introduced with the idea of drink in line 2. The eye fills
the cup of flattery for the mind, giving to it those flavours which it
knows
the mind will not refuse.

13. If it be poisoned, 'tis the lesser sin

If
it be poisoned - i.e. if the
cup of flattery has poison in it, such that it misleads, dupes and
drugs
the mind into thinking the situation is other than it is, as a
flatterer
dupes a king to make him do things to the flatterer's advantage, and
not
to his own. The idea of flattery as a poisoned drink is found also in
Henry
V:

'tis the
lesser sin
- this refers to line 14. The sin is a lesser one because the mind is
not
wholly responsible, but has been misled by the eye.

14. That mine eye loves it and doth first begin.

That
= because;
mine eye loves it - the it could refer to
the flattery, which
the eye also drinks up and enjoys. If the imagery is that of a taster
tasting
the cup for the king, then the eye tastes it first, doth
first begin,
finds its taste agreeable, and passes it on to the king, who is also
flattered
by it. Mind and eye are therefore further confused in the couplet, and
despite
the master/servant relationship pre-supposed, it remains unclear who or
what is responsible for what sin.

However several
interpretations of these two lines
are possible. KDJ and GBE both seem to take it as meaning that the eye,
in comparison with the mind, sins less, because it suffers the greater
temptation
of liking what it sees. The sin referred to seems
to be simply that
of loving, perhaps idolatrously, the youth.

Sonnet 142 refers to
love as sin, in a different
context however, and the object of love in that case is the dark lady:
Love is my sin, and thy dear virtue hate,